Because it completely dictated the flow of battle so much that pushing into a bubble was basically suicide against a force as large as yours.

It also rendered virtually all forms of projectile ranged attacks useless in large group fights due to the overwhelming amount of them and when combined with chokes.

It's essentially PoF's version of the pre nerfed Dragon Hunter immob gates skill. Something that was so insanely powerful for controlling movement of your enemies and promoting pirate ship that people just quit the mode and will probably never come back.

It was an OP skill and this was evident from the Beta Weekend. It's an embarrassment that it took this long to address.

Because WoD has had such a tremendous impact in WvW it is imposisble to tease out the nuance of a perfect reduction for everyone. When an ability is so hefty that we have to cull a big part of it we have to keep an eye on it in and watch how things shake out and what direction they're moving in.

So we're doing that when we're playing, discussing with you both in-game and out, through stream watching, and forum reading (so thank you for the constructive feedback).

It may be that the 2.5s delay before it starts stripping boons is too long. Or that the CD for its impact is prohibitive. If so we'll look to adjust them accordingly.

Because WoD has had such a tremendous impact in WvW it is imposisble to tease out the nuance of a perfect reduction for everyone. When an ability is so hefty that we have to cull a big part of it we have to keep an eye on it in and watch how things shake out and what direction they're moving in.

So we're doing that when we're playing, discussing with you both in-game and out, through stream watching, and forum reading (so thank you for the constructive feedback).

It may be that the 2.5s delay before it starts stripping boons is too long. Or that the CD for its impact is prohibitive. If so we'll look to adjust them accordingly.

As someone who mains Spellbreaker in WvW, while respecting your original decision to nerf the skill, here are my suggestions for a "perfect reduction":

Cooldown reduced from 90 seconds to 60 seconds.
Cast time reduced to from 1 + 1/2 second to simply 1/2 second.

Since the original idea for this nerf was to allow for more counterplay by allowing the players inside of the bubble a one second grace period, the original concept for a long cast time which would allow for counterplay is now too much combined with the extra counterplay time you added. Reducing the cast time by a second seems fair, since everyone else has an extra second now too.

The cooldown reduction is a response to the heavy duration nerf from 10 seconds to 5 seconds. In my opinion a 33% cooldown reduction is a fair response to the 50% duration nerf.

Because WoD has had such a tremendous impact in WvW it is imposisble to tease out the nuance of a perfect reduction for everyone. When an ability is so hefty that we have to cull a big part of it we have to keep an eye on it in and watch how things shake out and what direction they're moving in.

So we're doing that when we're playing, discussing with you both in-game and out, through stream watching, and forum reading (so thank you for the constructive feedback).

It may be that the 2.5s delay before it starts stripping boons is too long. Or that the CD for its impact is prohibitive. If so we'll look to adjust them accordingly.

As someone who mains Spellbreaker in WvW, while respecting your original decision to nerf the skill, here are my suggestions for a "perfect reduction":

Cooldown reduced from 90 seconds to 60 seconds.
Cast time reduced to from 1 + 1/2 second to simply 1/2 second.

Since the original idea for this nerf was to allow for more counterplay by allowing the players inside of the bubble a one second grace period, the original concept for a long cast time which would allow for counterplay is now too much combined with the extra counterplay time you added. Reducing the cast time by a second seems fair, since everyone else has an extra second now too.

The cooldown reduction is a response to the heavy duration nerf from 10 seconds to 5 seconds. In my opinion a 33% cooldown reduction is a fair response to the 50% duration nerf.

Thank you.

Cast time shouldn't be any lower than 1 second. Its still a very powerful skill when used well, significantly too powerful to be anything less than a 1 second cast. 2 seconds is still a pretty long time for someone to react against it, but the reason for the 1 second delay as stated by @Irenio CalmonHuang.2048 is that the first strip happened before the effect was even visible, which is honestly a pretty kitten mechanic. If the delay is too long with a 1 sec cast, then ANet should consider reducing the first interval to 1/2 second (and possibly moving up when the effect starts to show up in the cast), and then leave it at that. But anything less than 1 sec cast for this is broken

Because WoD has had such a tremendous impact in WvW it is imposisble to tease out the nuance of a perfect reduction for everyone. When an ability is so hefty that we have to cull a big part of it we have to keep an eye on it in and watch how things shake out and what direction they're moving in.

So we're doing that when we're playing, discussing with you both in-game and out, through stream watching, and forum reading (so thank you for the constructive feedback).

It may be that the 2.5s delay before it starts stripping boons is too long. Or that the CD for its impact is prohibitive. If so we'll look to adjust them accordingly.

As someone who mains Spellbreaker in WvW, while respecting your original decision to nerf the skill, here are my suggestions for a "perfect reduction":

Cooldown reduced from 90 seconds to 60 seconds.
Cast time reduced to from 1 + 1/2 second to simply 1/2 second.

Since the original idea for this nerf was to allow for more counterplay by allowing the players inside of the bubble a one second grace period, the original concept for a long cast time which would allow for counterplay is now too much combined with the extra counterplay time you added. Reducing the cast time by a second seems fair, since everyone else has an extra second now too.

The cooldown reduction is a response to the heavy duration nerf from 10 seconds to 5 seconds. In my opinion a 33% cooldown reduction is a fair response to the 50% duration nerf.

Thank you.

Cast time shouldn't be any lower than 1 second. Its still a very powerful skill when used well, significantly too powerful to be anything less than a 1 second cast. 2 seconds is still a pretty long time for someone to react against it, but the reason for the 1 second delay as stated by @Irenio CalmonHuang.2048 is that the first strip happened before the effect was even visible, which is honestly a pretty kitten mechanic. If the delay is too long with a 1 sec cast, then ANet should consider reducing the first interval to 1/2 second (and possibly moving up when the effect starts to show up in the cast), and then leave it at that. But anything less than 1 sec cast for this is broken

I suppose you might be right about a 1/2 cast being too fast, so in hindsight I will have to agree with you that a 1 second cast would be more appropriate.

@OriOri.8724 said:
But anything less than 1 sec cast for this is broken

Or maybe not? In order to successfully place WoD, warrior has to use stances so they don't get obliterated/interrupted immediately.
So maybe if the skill is left on longer CD (90 sec), the cast time could be reduced to 3/4 or 1/2 second.
In the end, it doesn't matter for enemy team, the bubble will pop up anyway, it's just nice balance change for warrior.

and the counterplay to boon spam now is to stack more scourges (and more boon spam fbs) which is pretty poor balance wise in my opinion

This really is always going to be the case since the boon hemorrhaging distilled strain of AIDS power creep that was injected into the game with HoT. PoF looks to be designed largely to hard counter much of the HoT competitive meta which was built on a disproportionately high amount of boon sources (further exacerbated by long durations, low cds, many AoE sources) as compared to boon strip, conversion or denial.

The warrior's WoD was the easiest nerf, as Scourge and FB are going to be much trickier to sort out. For example even with a heavy handed nerf to FB just means that groups will go back to stacking two per party. A nerf (depending on the specifics) to Scourges may push groups to go back to stacking on survivability and grinding down opponents (ala HoT style).

@OriOri.8724 said:
But anything less than 1 sec cast for this is broken

Or maybe not? In order to successfully place WoD, warrior has to use stances so they don't get obliterated/interrupted immediately.
So maybe if the skill is left on longer CD (90 sec), the cast time could be reduced to 3/4 or 1/2 second.
In the end, it doesn't matter for enemy team, the bubble will pop up anyway, it's just nice balance change for warrior.

Or, in other words, the warrior will have to actually plan using what is still a very powerful area denial skill, otherwise it could be interrupted.

well if they do play , they will notice there arent any sb's left so goodness knows how they will evaluate the changes.
there weren't many to start with.......(clue there....)
the massive cast time meant it had to be planned for, the fact you had to use all utilities to get it off meant it had to be built for.

even if the cast time is shortened I wont be going back to sb. 60% is way over the top, making it easier to play isnt the answer.
SB was a one trick pony and to get the bubbles off took a fair amount of understanding of the ebb and flow.
sorry to see it go.
lets all go scourge!

@OriOri.8724 said:
But anything less than 1 sec cast for this is broken

Or maybe not? In order to successfully place WoD, warrior has to use stances so they don't get obliterated/interrupted immediately.
So maybe if the skill is left on longer CD (90 sec), the cast time could be reduced to 3/4 or 1/2 second.
In the end, it doesn't matter for enemy team, the bubble will pop up anyway, it's just nice balance change for warrior.

Having to use a few utilities to run headlong into 60+ players who see you coming ...You do know most classes couldn't do that even if they dropped everything on the approach?

We've given an unstoppable (for long enough to deliver WoD) class a skill that must be avoided by everyone. I'm not even sure how a cast time affects this skill negatively as they're immune to everything during the approach. Just hit the button a second earlier.

The monkey push with stances thing isn't the pro approach but it can still work because stances are still kinda crazy. the pro approach is chain veil in drop bubbles right on their face so they're dead before they even know what's up.

@Israel.7056 said:
The monkey push with stances thing isn't the pro approach but it can still work because stances are still kinda crazy. the pro approach is chain veil in drop bubbles right on their face so they're dead before they even know what's up.

Top end gameplay discussion feels out of place here
When we talk about Www application in average it's the allah-hu-ahkbar warrior running in to bubble and trading it's life to do so... And how weird it is that the warriors themselves would want this as their role. <,<

Timing as in you wait for somebody else to have already made the clutch play, or as in baddies didn't see you coming from the side?
If you're fighting bad players you shouldn't need a bubble in the first place, if you're fighting competent players and you come in sideways, you'd better have stances up... Because death waits at 900 range for the first couple infiltrators.

@Israel.7056 said:
The monkey push with stances thing isn't the pro approach but it can still work because stances are still kinda crazy. the pro approach is chain veil in drop bubbles right on their face so they're dead before they even know what's up.

Top end gameplay discussion feels out of place here
When we talk about Www application in average it's the allah-hu-ahkbar warrior running in to bubble and trading it's life to do so... And how weird it is that the warriors themselves would want this as their role. <,<

I think they're either being intellectually dishonest and acting like they don't know how the skill is actually used by the better organized groups or they're genuinely clueless about how this skill is being used because they don't play with or against a good organized group.

I mean there's a lot of people who are still currently complaining on these forums about "pirate shipping" when the only good NA guild I've played against that's full committed to range bombs and only range bombs and actually making it work is Kek and they still use bubble bombs with grav wells and pulls. Literally every other decent guild I've played against has been melee heavy chain veiling bubble bombers. Nothing has changed since the nerf either.

@Miko.4158 said:
veiling bubbles isn't exactly pro play its just strategy.
also makes a noob a bubble bomber.
its all in the timings and angles.

there's alot of issues with veil and stealth.......
separate issue.

Whether you consider it pro or not is irrelevant the point is that spellbreakers don't have to pop every defensive CD and charge into the enemy by themselves just to get a good winds off like so many have tried to claim in defense of WoD.

same is true for everything if you co-ordinate veil.
or portal.
or jump down.
however any of these with bubble is wrong, the cast time means its not on impact.
most of the time its not even on the zerg which has moved round.

you have to get in front. most of the bulid is stab/stab related
you wouldn't do an individual sb veil, even if you did its to not going to last to make any sort of impact.

@OriOri.8724 said:
But anything less than 1 sec cast for this is broken

Or maybe not? In order to successfully place WoD, warrior has to use stances so they don't get obliterated/interrupted immediately.
So maybe if the skill is left on longer CD (90 sec), the cast time could be reduced to 3/4 or 1/2 second.
In the end, it doesn't matter for enemy team, the bubble will pop up anyway, it's just nice balance change for warrior.

Having to use a few utilities to run headlong into 60+ players who see you coming ...You do know most classes couldn't do that even if they dropped everything on the approach?

We've given an unstoppable (for long enough to deliver WoD) class a skill that must be avoided by everyone. I'm not even sure how a cast time affects this skill negatively as they're immune to everything during the approach. Just hit the button a second earlier.

So basically, use all your stances only to use elite skill and then be easy kill for 40/60 seconds... I am not saying that pre-nerf WoD was balanced, but if you wanted to actually successfully place WoD on proper spot, you had to sacrifice something. I also saw some spellbreakers suiciding just to place WoD which was very sad...
The cast time has its QoL aspect, both in PvE and WvW. Now with the nerfed disenchantment application and more time given to react, I don't see much issue with reducing cast time. You won't go into/in front of enemy zerg to place WoD without using stances anyway, not even with instant cast time.

@Israel.7056 said:
The monkey push with stances thing isn't the pro approach but it can still work because stances are still kinda crazy. the pro approach is chain veil in drop bubbles right on their face so they're dead before they even know what's up.

@Miko.4158 said:
same is true for everything if you co-ordinate veil.
or portal.
or jump down.
however any of these with bubble is wrong, the cast time means its not on impact.
most of the time its not even on the zerg which has moved round.

you have to get in front. most of the bulid is stab/stab related
you wouldn't do an individual sb veil, even if you did its to not going to last to make any sort of impact.

Those are guild l2p issues imo anything can go wrong where team coordination is involved. You should not have to blow a bunch of stances and/or overextend yourself to get a good bubbled bomb off with your guild even after the nerf.

It's very clear they don't play sb, probably just don't even like warrior's in general and don't get what the nerf to WoD means. We now have to predict what a zerg is going to do because it's now 2.5 seconds until it's even effective, allot can happen in those 2.5 seconds.

@Miko.4158 said:
its quite clear you dont play sb.
first its your server , now its the guild and l2p.
this about why the nerf is over the top.
whose next santa?

You are clearly very biased because you main SB and it doesn't seem to me like you can look at this issue with anything approaching objectivity.

I don't main it but I've played it a fair bit and imo WoD was broken af pre nerfs and I think it's still incredibly powerful even after all the nerfs. The skill has just been so impactful since PoF release that it was actually worth the risk to just run in ahead of everyone else and get the skill off no matter what even if it meant dying. That's how broken WoD was. There is no other skill in this game that's so powerful that it's actually worth yoloing into people in a zerg fight just to use that one skill before dying or running away with no CDs left and there is no other class in the game that can actually have a chance of surviving while playing that way.

You may actually have to learn how to coordinate your skill usage and positioning with your guild now but I promise you that both are entirely doable and that bubble bombs still work great when executed properly, they just take a bit more teamwork now because the window for their effective use is smaller than it used to be.

@Red Haired Savage.5430 said:
We now have to predict what a zerg is going to do because it's now 2.5 seconds until it's even effective, allot can happen in those 2.5 seconds.

You just need to call it out now it's just like everything else. If you wait for the call out and then count it down it will help everyone else to know when and where to drop their ccs and damage and if the enemy moves you cancel it.

@Red Haired Savage.5430 said:
We now have to predict what a zerg is going to do because it's now 2.5 seconds until it's even effective, allot can happen in those 2.5 seconds.

You just need to call it out now it's just like everything else. If you wait for the call out and then count it down it will help everyone else to know when and where to drop their ccs and damage and if the enemy moves you cancel it.

It's 1.5 seconds to cast...they still have an entire second to react...allot can still happen even after it's cast.

@Red Haired Savage.5430 said:
We now have to predict what a zerg is going to do because it's now 2.5 seconds until it's even effective, allot can happen in those 2.5 seconds.

You just need to call it out now it's just like everything else. If you wait for the call out and then count it down it will help everyone else to know when and where to drop their ccs and damage and if the enemy moves you cancel it.

It's 1.5 seconds to cast...they still have an entire second to react...allot can still happen even after it's cast.

you don't seem to understand that organized group will stealth their warrior as Israel said. Anet should reduce cast time but the WoD's nerf wasn't over the top. It could be nerfed even more and still be used because it's a unique mechanic which allow scourge/rev/weaver to be so efficient.

I mean there's a lot of people who are still currently complaining on these forums about "pirate shipping" when the only good NA guild I've played against that's full committed to range bombs and only range bombs and actually making it work is Kek and they still use bubble bombs with grav wells and pulls. Literally every other decent guild I've played against has been melee heavy chain veiling bubble bombers. Nothing has changed since the nerf either.

They can go melee because they chain WoD, otherwise they would pirate ship. If you have two opponents with same level, they will play mind games at range for so long that you get bored until one of the two can take advantage of a good bubble on top of enemy even if nerfs have made meta more melee than it used to be on PoF release.

@Acyk.9671 said:
They can go melee because they chain WoD, otherwise they would pirate ship. If you have two opponents with same level, they will play mind games at range for so long that you get bored until one of the two can take advantage of a good bubble on top of enemy even if nerfs have made meta more melee than it used to be on PoF release.

Meh I dunno. Personally I think Kek is pretty much the only guild doing the range game well enough to actually worry about pushing without WoD ready.

On the other hand WoD is just so strong it's like it spoils everyone because it makes everything so much easier.